“take it slow it’ll work itself out fine; all we need is just a little patience” -Guns ‘n Roses

I’ve had what feels like a hundred ideas for a blog this week, but with each one started came the realization that it just wasn’t quite right. So, I decided to take my family for a walk as inspiration. My amazing wife, my beautiful 3 year old daughter, and my rambunctious 6 year old mutt of a dog set out with me for a 0.7 mile journey around our block.

One thing you need to realize is that I really want to be able to take nightly walks with my family; I really want to enstill the joy of spending time outdoors being active. Another thing you need to realize is that going for a walk with my family is not enjoyable. For instance, have you ever seen a dog that walks so well that it doesn’t even need a leash? That’s not my dog. I know it’s completely my fault for the lack of proper training I gave her when she was still young, but it’s a constant tug-of-war between the two of us while we’re on our walk. It doesn’t help that we’re incredibly inconsistent when it comes to walking, so she’s never been able to really learn well. Then there’s the daughter. As any 3 year old, she moves at her own pace. Sometimes it’s incredibly fast – sometimes it’s incredibly slow. It’s rarely right at the pace we’re hoping for. On this particular evening, it was incredibly slow. Between admonishing the dog and encouraging the daughter, I had no time to talk to my wife. It was not enjoyable.

As we neared the end of our journey, I found myself thinking about patience and my lack thereof. Why do we get impatient? A simple answer is because we want things to be easier right now. We don’t care about the journey or the lessons learned along the way, we just want things to be easier right NOW. I want my dog to walk this walk like one of those dogs who don’t need a leash. I want my daughter to walk like a 30 year old. In that moment of impatience, I don’t care about her expressing her independence or finding her own path – I just want to have a nice walk.

We do this in other areas of life, too. We don’t allow time for processes to work or for things to develop in their own time – it’s the age we live in. I’m constantly frustrated at how “slow” my internet connection is at work. Then I remember that just 10 years ago, I was using dial-up. At least once a week I have someone come in the store and tell me about an injury that happened because they rushed into a training program or came back too quickly from a separate injury or tried to transition into a barefoot-type shoe without proper preparation. We live in a culture of instant gratification. If we want something, we want it now. My worry is that we’re missing out on the journey.